Category Archives: Middle East

A group of separatists in southern Yemen, backed by the United Arab Emirates (UAE), has declared a state of emergency in the port city of Aden and vowed to overthrow the country’s internationally recognised government within the next week. Aidarous al-Zubaidi, the leader of the Southern Transitional Council (STC), said Yemen’s parliament would be barred…

Tensions in the Red Sea region have been brewing for months but came to the fore when Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited Sudan last month. The visit, hailed as historic, was the first by a Turkish head of state since 1956 when Sudan gained independence. Sudan’s official state news agency said the two countries…

A report by the New York Times has said that while Egypt’s government was publicly condemning a US decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, a state intelligence officer was asking influential TV hosts in the country to persuade their viewers to accept it. The newspaper reported on Saturday that it had obtained audio recordings…

The Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs recently announced it has suspended sales of arms and ammunition to the United Arab Emirates. The ministry had expressed concern that these arms could be used in Yemen resulting in an intensification of the humanitarian crisis that has engulfed the country since the outbreak of the war in 2015. According…

Pro-Palestine activists in India have accused Israel of exploiting Bollywood in a bid to improve its global image after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took a “selfie” on stage with legendary movie star Amitabh Bachchan while visiting Mumbai. Activists made the claims after the Israeli government staged an outreach event titled “Shalom Bollywood” on Thursday…

A member of the Qatari royal family, who was allegedly held against his will in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), has accused Saudi Arabia and the UAE of orchestrating a months-long Gulf crisis in order to seize Qatar’s wealth, and threatened to commit suicide. Sheikh Abdullah bin Ali Al Thani was previously portrayed by Saudi Arabia…

In a rare move, United Nations human rights experts called on Saudi Arabia on Tuesday to end the “repression” of rights activists and release dozens detained since September for peacefully exercising their civil and political rights. More than 60 prominent clerics, writers, journalists, academics and activists are reported to have been detained in a wave…

Looking back, Mohamed Hamdi, a taxi driver in his early 40s, now says he was “overzealous” in his support for the new president, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, when he secured a landslide win in Egypt’s presidential elections little more than three years ago. “I had high hopes he would heavily improve this battered economy after many…

Bollywood superstar Amitabh Bachchan thrilled Israeli officials in India after opening his home to the Israeli consulate in Mumbai. The actor received gushing applause from Israel’s Consul General Yaakov Finkelstein for his “active role in cooperation between Bollywood and Israel”. Finkelstein thanked Bachchan on Tuesday in a tweet following a meeting with the actor at…

Over the past decade, there has been a proliferation of personal essays and book-length accounts by writers who have visited the Occupied Territories. Their aim has been to illuminate for a mainly Western audience issues previously ignored, or over-simplified, in the media of their home countries, and thereby to reframe international perceptions of the Palestinian…